"A person often meets his destiny on the road he took to avoid it."
Jean de la Fontaine
They had left the city limits and merged onto the slow slog of the holiday-packed highway before Jareth spoke again, breaking the mildly uncomfortable silence.
For his part the Goblin King had seemed rather innocently intrigued by the automobile, playing with the nobs and music settings until Sarah had finally slapped his hands away.
Queen had just come on the radio and he seemed rather taken by the music, so he let her.
"If I am to understand the terms of the deal, you are bringing home a fake boyfriend because your parents want you to settle down?"
Sarah, still on edge, glanced sideways and nodded.
"And you're hiring one because you lack a real one."
The sound of teeth gritting. "At the moment. But ultimately this is just easier." She eyed him again. "Or it would have been had I been able to hire some out of work actor who needed the money."
"Bringing home a king is a rather tremendous improvement then."
"Tremendous is not the word I'd use. Neither is improvement."
"Are you always this cheerful around the holidays?"
Sarah sighed. "Sorry. It's just this year I anticipate even more not so gentle hints that what my parents would really like for Christmas is a baby."
Jareth peered in the backseat at the pile of brightly wrapped presents.
"Your questionable child care skills aside, I am going to assume there is no infant in those boxes."
"Very funny." She shrugged. "They'll get used to disappointment." Another long suffering sigh followed because they wouldn't.
"It's not easier to give them what they want?"
Sarah's brows furrowed."What a baby? Those aren't exactly available at Macy's. And I am not having a baby just to shut them up."
Jareth smiled, managing to look entirely like the Goblin King again despite his veneer of normalcy. "I didn't say it had to you yours."
Sarah's face cracked in disbelief. "I am NOT stealing a child."
"Borrowing really. And if you insist I suppose I could be convinced to make one the old fashioned way."
She kept staring at him, her mouth dropping open further.
He reached out and nudged the steering wheel to keep them in their lane. "Eyes on the road, Sarah, unless your plan is to commit regicide."
She swatted him away and blew out a frustrated breath. "Tempting. The regicide," she specified when he looked like he might say more. "Let me make this clear: No baby stealing. No baby making."
"Scrooge."
They lapsed back into a moderately uncomfortable silence until Sarah pulled off the road to get a coffee. Feeling magnanimous she grudgingly offered him one too.
She stretched before getting back into her seat.
"Shall I drive for a bit?"
Sarah looked up in surprise. "You know how to drive?"
"No." He gestured around the rest stop. "But it can hardly be difficult if all these simple mortals can manage it."
An older woman getting into the car next to them did a double take.
"Get. In."
The weather was turning colder, the snow getting thicker and falling faster. Sarah turned her lights on and increased the wipers.
"You haven't asked about your little friends." The last word was said a touch distastefully.
She shot him a curious look.
"Oh, I assure you they are all intact. Despite their gross act of treason."
The guilt of not having spoken to them in so long filled her with dread. "Not bogged?"
"I can be generous." He didn't add reluctantly - that the sole thing that had spared them had been her very friendship with them in the first place. He didn't suppose she would receive their heads on a spike well.
"They often speak of you," he added coyly. "And something about a game of Scrabble?"
"Oh," Sarah replied in a small voice. "I did promise." Over the years she'd thought of them less and less but his sudden mention made it all rush back. Perhaps coupled with the timing of driving home to where it had all started, and the magic of the season made her feel a stinging pang of loss. "I miss them too."
Jareth's lips curled.
Eager to change the subject, Sarah sat up straighter. "Hopefully this weather doesn't get worse. I don't want to have to pull over."
"Oh, I don't know, stuck in a blizzard has a touch of romance. Cabin in the woods. Snowed in. Roaring fire."
Sarah snorted. "That sounds like a bad romance." One she would probably admittedly read.
"No, as you've made clear, it's a fake one. I suppose we ought to get our stories straight then. I could just be myself."
Sarah sipped the rest stop coffee and grimaced at the acrid taste. "Anything but, thanks. Just be Garrett whatshisname."
"The fact that you have to pay for companionship is starting to make sense," he remarked dryly.
Sarah bristled. "I don't have to pay for companionship, thank you very much. I'm making my vacation as stress free as possible. I'm bringing someone nice but suitably boring home to make my father and Karen happy."
"So nice and boring don't make you happy?"
Sarah caught the change in his tone, but answered honestly. "Not especially no." Their eyes met again and Sarah was struck by the notion that he rather liked her answer. Too much. She looked away quickly, her hands tightening on the wheel. "This is a one off thing. We'll call it off sometime into the New Year."
"That doesn't sound particularly believable."
"How so? Happens all the time. People drift apart. Relationships end."
"Perhaps, but I think Garrett "whatshisface" is the sort that wouldn't you slip through his fingers. Certainly not more than once."
The car was suddenly too small. And too warm. Sarah swallowed. "Garrett is exactly the type of nice guy who would."
"Perhaps. It's a good thing that I'm not Garrett then, as you so generously pointed out."
Definitely too warm. "Fine. Be you. Just… be less you. I don't know, you work in…"
A brow arched. "Child care?"
"No child care. Don't mention kids, don't look at kids, and definitely don't steal any kids."
Jareth managed to look affronted. "I have never stolen a child in my life."
Sarah ignored him. "You work in… sales. Just say sales."
"And what pray tell do I sell? My services to desperate young women?"
Sarah's coffee spluttered over the steering wheel. "Just try not to talk. The less said the better."
"And how did you gain my affections? What tender professions of love did you offer?"
"Not love. Don't you dare even breathe the 'l' word while we're there." The thought of Karen hinting at a January wedding began to give her heart palpitations. She eyed him pointedly. "And you pursued me."
"And how did I win you?" There was something in the way he said win that made Sarah squirm just a little.
"By… just being normal." She waved a hand indifferently. "Nice."
"All those things you have no interest in."
She knew he was making a point without saying it but she refused to play along. "It's a good thing it's all pretend then."
The Goblin King smiled. "As you say."
Sarah looked away. Happy for a change that the heavy snowfall meant she had to keep her focus on the roads. "We met at a… a Hallowe'en party."
"Ah, a traditional Samhain celebration."
"Sure – exactly."
"Complete with the ritual orgy."
The car hit ice, or at least that is what she'd claim later.
"No orgies."
"Too forward on a first date?"
She could hear the teasing in his tone. "You're enjoying this," she accused.
Jareth laughed outright, his voice still far too velvety for the small space. "You have no idea."
Sarah managed to get a few more words of serious planning in, giving them both a decent back story that should pass mild scrutiny. Met at a Hallowe'en party. NO orgies. Started dating casually, gradually got more serious. Mutual interest in Renaissance art, Sarah assured him that neither Karen nor her father would ask them a thing about it. He works in sales, Sarah told him to mention technology so that both parents would be terrified to ask more. He went to a good school, but not a great school – something her father would have been interested in. Only child, so no need to speak about brothers or sisters, etc., etc.
She was starting to feel marginally more relaxed about the whole affair when they hit the toll booth.
Sarah realised she'd spent all the change on the coffees and was rifling through her purse in a panic when they pulled up to the window. She couldn't find her credit card either.
The attendant made a sound of pronounced impatience. "Ma'am, I'm going to have to ask you to pull out of line."
Jareth, who'd been blessedly quiet after they'd established their mutual history frowned. He leaned over the frazzled Sarah to speak in a low tone. "That's not really necessary is it?"
The man frowned back, opened his mouth to respond, and then his face just smoothed into a serene expression of bliss.
"Not necessary in the least. Carry on."
The Goblin King nodded. "Happy Yuletide."
The attendant's head bobbed back. "Happy Yuletide."
Sarah stared between the two and only accelerated when the car behind her honked. "You just… you just Obi Wan Kenobi'd him!"
The Goblin king sat back, adjusting his coat. "I assure you, Sarah, I have no idea what that means."
"You… you never mind." She chewed her lip. "Don't do that again."
"You're welcome."
"Thank you," she said a little sheepishly. "But don't do that again." Unless you can make Karen not want grandkids for a few more years. Too risky. "Just… just don't."
The Goblin King smiled innocently. "Do what?"
They were still arguing about it when they finally pulled up to her childhood home. Sarah turned the engine off gratefully. She hated driving for long stretches. Being a passenger was fine but being so focused for so long was taxing. She was happy the roads had remained driveable despite the weather.
Sarah pulled her cat out of the back seat, and then paused, eyes taking in the not-Goblin King.
About to enter her house. With her family.
It wasn't too late to back out, she panicked, looking back at the Victorian. Catching her expression, he spread his hands. "Best behaviour. I'll get the bags."
She bit her lip and then nodded. It hadn't been the worst car ride really. He'd been distracting but engaging. It was still rather surreal really. Bringing the Goblin King home for Christmas. Although other than the toll booth, he hadn't done anything too inhuman.
She glanced back and nearly dropped the carrier.
He was following behind her, hands folded in his pockets as their suitcases and the presents floated alongside him.
"Jareth!" she screeched. The not-Goblin King looked immediately pleased. It was the first time she'd ever called him by his name.
"Sarah!"
She turned helplessly at the affectionate squeal from Karen, who stood in the now open door, her father beaming alongside her.
When she turned back around in a panic, Jareth was standing behind her, his arms laden with bags and presents.
"And you must be…" Karen motioned for them to come up the stairs.
"Call me, Jareth," he said smoothly, flashing her step mother a devastating smile that made all the panic come rushing back to Sarah.
"Here let me get those!" Sarah's father reached out and clumsily managed to whisk the parcels out of Jareth's arms.
A moment later Sarah felt a hand settle on her lower back.
"Thank you for having me, Mrs. Williams."
Karen tittered in a way Sarah had never seen before.
"Oh, do call me Karen. We're practically family." She shot Sarah an overt look of wagging approval that made Sarah want to start the car, put it in reverse, and drive right into that first snowbank.
Peaches was also pulled her from her hand, as both she and Jareth were practically dragged into the doorway. The not-Goblin King's arm still encircled her waist in a way that was entirely impossible to ignore. She would most certainly have to go over the "minimal contact" clause again. This was a business arrangement, nothing more.
Sarah was about to move away to hug her parents when her father motioned her to stay put and winked. Karen giggled. Actually giggled. Like she wasn't a grown woman in her early fifties.
Sarah looked confused until her father winked again, his expression strangely indulgent, and Karen motioned upwards with a well-manicured hand.
Mistletoe.
Right above their heads.
Confusion turned to panic. Definitely should have hit that snowbank.
Sarah glanced sideways, hoping mistletoe was a uniquely aboveground tradition.
The slow grin suggested he knew exactly what the cluster of small berries meant. The splayed hand at her back tugged.
AN: Oh wow, mistletoe. What a surprise. I am certain no one could have expected that to happen. How did that get there?
It would also be a shame if *author darts eyes* there weren't enough beds in the house.